Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Non-Art Rejection
2. 35 U.S.C. § 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefore, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title".
3. Claims 1-5 and 7-8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 101 because the claimed invention is directed to judicial exception (i.e., an abstract idea, law of nature, or nature phenomenon) without significant more.
Claims 1-5 and 7-8 recite an abstract idea. This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because claims 1-5 and 7-8 are directed to a broad plan, concept or mental process that can be performed in human mind, or by a human using a pen and paper, i.e., identifying certain type of data (valid or invalid) from a report. The instant claims are not positively tied to a particular computer implemented process that accomplishes the claimed method. For instance, it is not clear if the resource configuration information is electronically received from a base station and whether the steps must be performed by the computer terminal.
Moreover, claims 1-5 and 7-8 do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the terminal as recited is a generic computing component rather than specific computer component that transforms underlying subject matter. The claims also recite receiving data from a base station which merely indicates the source of the data but still fails to clearly define a computer implemented process because data obtained from the base station could be processed in form of a paper report to be reviewed by human. Since the claim as a whole fail to add significant more to the exception (abstract idea), claims 1-5 and 7-8 do not qualify as a statutory process.
4. The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor.
5. Claims 2 and 11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as failing to set forth the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
The following language is vague and indefinite:
In claim 1, line 2, “indexes for the second RACH occasions are assigned other than indexes assigned to the first RACH..”, it is not clear as to whether “other than” refers to different index or different assignment method.
The same indefiniteness of claim 2 is also applied to claim 11.
Allowable Subject Matter
6. Claims 6 and 9 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
7. Claims 10 and 12-15 are allowed over prior art of record.
Conclusion
8. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Viet Vu whose telephone number is 571-272-3977. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday through Thursday from 8:00am to 6:00pm. The Group general information number is 571-272-2400. The Group fax number is 571-273-8300.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's supervisor, Emmanuel Moise, can be reached at 571-272-3865.
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/Viet D Vu/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2455
8/24/26
Prosecution Insights